Wednesday, August 31, 2011

UN acknowledges 57,200 missing people (desaparecidos) in Colombia, much more than all dictatorships of the continent together ··> Azalea Robles[es].

Colombian watchdogs actually claim 61,604 missing. One of the latest is ecologist Sandra Viviana Cuéllar who disappeared in February this year by order of local and multinational speculators ambitioning the lands she fought for ··> LINYM[es].

Former prisoner threatened with fascist style graffiti at her home town of Zizur Nagusia ··> SA[es], Ateak Ireki[es].

A hundred people protest brutal repression against youths before ruling party see at Pamplona ··> Ateak Ireki[eu].

Slovakia: Left appeals for protests against anti-communist laws that will make any sympathy with the achievements of the socialist system a crime ··> Morning Star.

Germany - NATOland: Christian-Zionist islamophobic extremist meet at Berlin. The Breivik-like militants include Hilde de Lobel and Barbara Bonte from Vlaams Belang (Flemish fascist party), Susanne Winter of FPÖ (Austrian fascists) and Tylor Rose from the US Youth for Western Civilization, akin to the Tea Party (Gringo fascists within the far-right Republican Party). Several protests were attempted against this neonazi meeting but they were protected by police and the German state ··> Diagonal[es].

Sardinia: thieves use sleeping gas against the super-wealthy. Probably the only work available soon at your area: to be smarter than the filthy rich smartasses who steal our lives ··> The Guardian.

Palestine: Israel trains death squads among settlers. New genocide spurt in the making? ··> BBC.

USA:

Wikileaks' cable show that US diplomats promote GMOs worldwide (see also Monsanto note at bottom of this entry) ··> Uruknet.

Maryland: nuclear power plant lost transformer and one emergency generator with hurricane Irene ··> Energy News.

Virginia: water pipes under damaged nuclear power plant are potentially a major danger (who decided to build water-pipes under a nuclear power plant, I wonder?). Demand that plant distributes bottled water to residents ··> Energy News.

California: arrests of speakers at BART station in San Francisco metropolitan area. I am not sure what this conflict is around but it's clear that Californians are very angry at this public transport company ··> video at PO.

Bolivia: military and political criminals declared guilty of genocide for the massacres of Black October 2003 ··> BBC, LINYM[es].

Grimsson said: “We were told that if we refused the international community’s conditions, we would become the Cuba of the North. But if we had accepted, we would have become the Haiti of the North.”

...

Icelanders didn't stop there: they decided to draft a new constitution that would free the country from the exaggerated power of international finance and virtual money. (...) To write the new constitution, the people of Iceland elected twenty-five citizens from among 522 adults not belonging to any political party but recommended by at least thirty citizens. This document was not the work of a handful of politicians, but was written on the internet. The constituent’s meetings are streamed on-line, and citizens can send their comments and suggestions, witnessing the document as it takes shape. The constitution that eventually emerges from this participatory democratic process will be submitted to parliament for approval after the next elections.

In capitalism’s mythology, society functions according to merit. Wealth and decadence are the tell-tale signs of hard work and brilliance paying off, while poverty is a sign of laziness, irresponsibility and a disposition or work-ethic undeserving of the products of society.

...

Yet there is one facet of our social reality that is missed in this chauvinist analysis — a facet which, by its very existence, defeats this perception. There are those in our society who, despite working long hours under stressful (even dangerous) conditions and laboring in positions which are essential for the success of our overall economy, live well below the poverty line and must combine their long hours of work with public assistance programs to survive.

Tuesday, August 30, 2011

There's no difference between the two twin parties of the Spanish (or any other bourgeois) political system. They quickly agreed one of the few constitutional reforms since Franco's death and they are performing it without any referendum whatsoever.

The reform is meant to establish a debt ceiling, what in practical terms means to cut the army and the police forces to zero and to massively tax the rich. Just joking of course, in practical terms it means suppressing all established public services except the institutional repression in favor the bourgeois class and its privilege of property.

And that's the trend in Europe and all NATOland.

Naturally a referendum would mean, most likely, that the reform would be rejected.

Meanwhile critical reforms like the recognition of the right of self-determination of the peoples are and will never be produced. I'm bored of listening to the propaganda pre-designed phrase "but we have democracy". No we do not have democracy while the Basque People cannot freely decide our destiny.

But even Spaniards have no democracy, being only able to choose between identical twins... evil twins.

Important Update: demo at Madrid on Thursday

A demonstration has been called for next Thursday September 1st at Madrid at Atocha (street?, plaza? station?).

Some of the adherents are: Vallekas' Assembly for the General Strike, Popular Athenaeus of Solidarity among the Peoples, Antifascist Coordination of Madrid, CJC, Communist Initiative, IzCa, Communist Party of the Peoples of Spain, Red Network, SAS...

The legal argument is that any constitutional reform that affects fundamental rights must go through referendum and this one does because it establishes how the citizens must be enslaved to pay to the banks and speculators; so this hurried modification is in unconstitutional and, if it goes ahead, amounts to a true coup.

Another demo has been called by the twin mainstream unions UGT and CC.OO. for September 6. While these two unions have been losing appeal because of being part of the false democracy system, they still retain some capacity of mobilization.

Basque Country: Anonymous stickers appeal to place thumbtacks on roads as the Spanish nationalist biking competition La Vuelta is imposed again on the Basque Country taking advantage of a unilateral ceasefire by armed organization ETA:

Thumbtack Day, says the sticker

Traditionally, since I have memory, every single time that the Spanish authorities tried to impose La Vuleta on the territory of the Basque Country bomb threats dissuaded them or made the march so painfully slow and cautious that became worthless as competition and sport show.

As ETA has declared a unilateral cease fire for some time now, any such bomb threat may be not credible, but that does not mean that the Basque People is resigning to the Spanish impositions and is instead reacting with creativity, I would say.

Nuclear Regulatory Commission report underlines that Virginia's North Anna nuclear power plant is in a an unanalyzed condition that significantly degrades plant safety. The earthquake may have exceeded the resistance capacity of the nuclear site ··> Energy News.

Student assassinated by policeman in Bogota on Aug. 19. Diego Felipe Becerra, 16, was shot down by policemen while running away after being caught while drawing graffiti ··> CPDDH.

Diego Felipe Becerra, assassinated by the Colombian state for drawing graffiti

Korea:

Workers march in Seoul demanding readmission of 400 fired comrades from Hanjin and are attacked with water cannon ··> Asia One.

Japan:

Tokyo metropolitan area's incinerator ash above radiation limit to allow it to be buried normally (must be treated as radioactive material). In some cases (Chiba) not significantly different from Fukushima (both 10x times the level of central Tokyo, which is already above the limit). Another seriously affected area is Iwate prefecture in the NE of Honshu ··> The Manichi Daily News, Japan Times, Energy News.

I tried to reply to the latter but then I realized that the comment sections is for members only, so here it is (because I think I came with something relevant to say) translated to English and also in the original Spanish version (scroll down).

The term lunpenproletariat is a most ambiguous concept because it could well be said that all workers are lumpen because, specially today with so much unemployment, all workers depend on the caprice of bourgeoisie. Also most of them lack a class ideology.

It is therefore normal that the concept of lunpenproletariat is ignored because, sincerely, I know drug traffickers with greater class consciousness than many workers with a contract.

As generic idea, the lunpenproletariat may be a useful concept, but it is not easy to make a difference with the other classes, specially at individual level. I do not think either that Fascism is based mainly on the lumpen, but on the petty bourgeoisie (specially when it becomes impoverished) and bourgeois-ized sectors of the working class.

Much more dangerous than the lumpen, which generally lacks of any power of its own, is the proletariat under bourgeois direction. We must not forget that Capitalism is nothing but the product of the working class, under the direction of a parasitic class: bourgeoisie, unable to create anything by itself but very capable of monopolizing power (mostly by economic but also political means) and of manipulating the working class against its own collective objective interests.

The keystone of the revolutionary process is the emancipation of the working class from ideological, economic and political domination by the parasitic bourgeois class. Marx as bourgeois (and in spite of his genius and greatness) had a somewhat bourgeois-ized view of the working class - and the working class itself often has it because it is mesmerized by the bourgeois imagnary, which steals its consciousness and destroys its revolutionary potential, effectively 'lumpenizing' almost all the proletariat.

Baburam Bhattarai (left), Vice-Chairman of the Unified Communist party of Nepal (Maoist) has become Prime Minister with the support of the United Democratic Madhesi Front. Together (plus smaller allies) they gathered some 340 votes for Bhattarai, slightly short of an absolute majority in the 594 seats' Parliament but enough to secure the appointment of the communist leader as Prime Minister.

The UCPN(M) alone has 230 seats, more than the Congress and the CPN(UML) together.

According to Harry Sims, posting at Revolution in South Asia today, the Congress party and their Marxist-Leninist allies reject Maoist participation in government because it retains a separate military apparatus (negotiations to integrate it in the Nepali Army have repeatedly failed). Also that:

The Maoist victory was made possible, thanks to a last minute ‘four-point agreement’ with the Madhesi parties on fundamental issues of ‘peace, constitution and functioning of a joint government’. The Maoists agreed to ‘positively revise’ their proposal for the integration and rehabilitation of Maoist combatants.

Political sources told The Hindu that the Madhesi parties would get 10-12 ministries, including Home and Defence.

A yet unnamed individual self-identified as 'Terrorblanche' (wordplay with the surname of Terreblanche a notorious Nazi killed last year in a murky rape incident) has become the most wanted criminal in South Africa overnight. The reason? This photo posted in his Facebook page:

The photo, which hurts the soul (sorry about that) appears to show a murder of a young boy, with the aggravation of racism.

The criminal had 588 'friends' on Facebook, many of which may have seen the photo, and none of which denounced the crime. In some cases they even left favorable remarks. These people are accomplices under South African and International laws.

However I fear that the justice system is too lenient with this type of crimes: even death penalty is too merciful for such devils.

Britain: rights groups protest plans by Tory-Fascist Cameron government to shut down Internet in case of social unrest ··> The Inquirer.

Libya: The total air raids of NATO mass-murder machinery was 20,518 (official figure). Most of them were bombing of civilian areas with depleted uranium bombs that leave radioactivity for centuries. ··> Atilio Boron[es].

Disney products made at slave and child labor factory in China. Concern over dangerous chemicals ··> The Guardian.

Chile:

When one falls, thousands arise

First mortal victim of social protests. Manuel Gutiérrez Reinoso, 14, was shot down by the Carabineros (military police) while walking at his neighborhood, for no reason at all. Another person, Mario Parraguez Pinto, 18, was critically injured by a bullet in the eye ··> LINYM[es], SA[es].

Also video of clashes Aug 25 with impressive images of water cannons and gas used by the police against citizens ··> PO.

Nicaragua:

Minimum salaries more than doubled while Sandinistas in power ··> LINYM[es].

Friday, August 26, 2011

The Chilean National Walkout for the social state and free quality education completed its second and last day.

The government authorized three demos but forbade the one which meant to go through the center of Santiago. The morning thus began with clashes between citizens and military police in the center of the capital, at the Alameda and around the University of Chile, which has been taken by students.

At least 108 arrested people (only in the morning) added to the 348 captured by police on Wednesday.

285 buses were damaged.

Earlier in the night residents of the suburbs fought back against military police shooting live fire. This resulted in three carabineros severely injured.

The forbidden demonstration gathered some 500,000 people. Police blocked the route, which meant to arrive to the presidential palace, La Moneda. Some socialdemocrats attempted to impede that the people fought back against police but fled the place when the police charged in full strength, beating them the same as the others.

Some five blocs away from La Moneda was where most fighting happened, with barricades and fires being set up.

The clashes continued until dusk.

Hunger strike ends

Also the students who had been on hunger strike for 35 days decided to stop the protest because of the risk for their lives.

Sweden: Ikea's founder Ingvar Kamprad, Nazi to the marrow. His wealth (our money and our work, you Capitalist thief!) is surely still financing far-right extremism in Europe and around the World, beware! ··> BBC.

Libya: Chaos and terror take over Tripoli as rebels move in ··> Uruknet (1, 2).

Kashmir: Ali Abuminah reminds us the terrible reality that Kashmiris suffer every day under Indian occupation, with constant risk of extrajudicial killings, rape, atrocious tortures... ··> Electronic Intifada.

Add caption

Chile: Police raided squats in Valparaiso and Santiago without presence of attorney and with fake judge authorizations, they found nothing, yet arrested people ··> Contra Info.

Chile: General Strike continues today with violence (left). Will make a synthesis later on ··> La Haine[es].

I must show here my total solidarity with this brave Scotsman, Stephen Gough (left), who has spent the last five years in prison only for walking around without clothes. One would think that repression of nudism was an obsolete disgrace and that had died with the likes of De Gaulle and Franco but it is still very much widespread and going around naked is only allowed in very few spaces, mostly beaches and private areas.

Whatever we may think it is a shame that anyone is being jailed just for walking around the way he is. He is not wearing a burka, he is not wearing a tie... he is not even wearing any pants at all. And that is his right, in Scotland as in Mecca.

The relation between Zionism and racism never ceases to amaze. On the one hand, Israel's willing apologists can't see 90% of the racism in Israel. Some can't see 110%. On the other hand, they have an ear with absolute pitch and subliminal sensitivity, that identifies not just racist notes, but even forth and fifth harmonics of racism, no matter how inaudible even to expert musicologists. But they hear those exquisitely difficult to hear tones on two conditions only: 1. The victim of racism is not an Arab. 2. The "perpetrator" of racism has criticized Israel.

The first journey of General Strike (or National Stop) in Chile has been completed but the second one begins now.

The strike has been a total success and has put upside down the South American country (at least the capital Santiago that hosts 40% of the population). It was announced already on Tuesday with a cacerolazo (massive pot banging).

The demands are varied but emphasis is on public quality non-profit education, increase of taxes to companies, formation of a state pension fund and more resources for health care and education: in other words, the state as re-distributor and proactive keeper of certain social equality and not as mere executor of the Capital.

Since very early in the morning barricades were set up in order to make the protest visible, impede road traffic and allow the free passage of the demonstrations. Police charged against them, arresting dozens.

Later a demonstration marched onto the see of the government the Palacio de la Moneda.

While 300 people tried to capture a police station at La Pincoya neighborhood, a drunk policeman shot on the hand his own boss.

In the afternoon the unions declared themselves very satisfied by the following of the national walkout, with one claiming 80% of following. Some 35 people are reported arrested.

The clashes between groups of people and police increased, being reported in many corners of the capital Santiago and cities of the interior. The use of petrol bombs seemed widespread. One of the street battles took place just a few blocs away from the government's see, while others took place near university buildings.

A notorious incident happened in the evening when a carabinero (military police) tried to arrest a student, causing her teacher to intervene in her help. At that point another policeman arrived and crying threats of "I'm going to shoot" threatened everybody. Finally both officers evacuated without making any arrests nor shooting nor anything else but the episode was filmed and has been watched thousands of times already:

By the evening police surrounded the offices of the major union, the Unitary Workers' Central (CUT).

Incidents may have continued through the night but I do not have confirmation at this point.

Whether Israel is occupant (the Zionist point of view) or it is a civil conflict of colonialist, apartheid, genocide and racist nature (the Native Palestinian viewpoint) the continuous aggression of Israel against Gaza Strip (as well as other Palestinians, Syrians, etc.) has no justification and would demand UN intervention if the UN made anything other than obey the USA (which in turn obeys to the Zionist Lobby with such dedication that is shameful even for those of us who are not North Americans).

Today Israel, with no pretext whatsoever, bombed again Gaza Strip. Three people were killed, assassinated.

If this is not a terrorist attack, what is terrorism?

Israel exerts terrorism every single day against Palestinians. But some days are worse than others.

A permanent Gernika, a permanent death camp...

When will the so-called International Community intervene to protect civilians?, to stop terrorism?, to defend democracy?

The democratically elected government of Palestine, led by Hamas, requested it.

The democratic media ignored the plea.

Will they bomb Tel Aviv, the same that they bomber Tripoli with depleted uranium bombs?

We all know that they will not. Their hypocrisy is infinite, their compassion nil.

Will us allow them to claim to represent us, making us accomplices of their criminal complicity? Or will we oust them and begin a new era.

Palestine is a reflection of the injustices and most serious problems that exist where you live, where I live...

There's only one Earth: it is small, it is crowded, dirty, exhausted, feverish... and we must fix it and we must do it soon.

The diary from robot operator H.S. is again available online after being taken down. It has been recovered from cache by IEEE Spectrum.

The diary begins in April 26th and ends in July 4th, covering the bulk of the Fukushima catastrophe as seen by an insider. As such it is a valuable present history document. However the content is not too informative: it's mostly about training with robots...

Some particularly notable excerpts:

April 27th

One of my dosimeter’s alarms began to go off and would not stop... When I asked one of the radiation management personnel... he said, "There is nothing wrong with it, so please continue your work". So, I did!

May 11th

The No. 4 nuclear reactor building where I was during the earthquake is now a disaster because of the tsunami. When I imagine what would have happened if I had been just 5 minutes late, even now I feel so fearful thinking of it.

July 3rd

Today we went and used two PackBots to measure the radiation levels on the first floor portion of the No. 3 nuclear reactor building where the Warrior cleaned (decontaminated) yesterday.

As a result, the radiation levels dropped on average about 10%.

If you are just looking at the measurement results, they still look pretty high, but on the other hand, if you just look at the difference [in certain areas], you get the feel that it was quite effective.

Wednesday, August 24, 2011

Basque Country: Bilbao fiestas on strike today. The konpartsak (popular festive clubs which are the backbone of the fiestas) close down for the full day in solidarity with two of them, Kaskagorri and Txori Barrote, banned by the Town Hall for placing photos of Basque prisoners. ··> Sare Antifaxista[es], Bilboko Konpartsak[eu].

Closed down txosna today

Only the visit to the hospitalized children and the official txupin (rocket shooting) took place today. However yesterday, the txupinera went to show her solidarity with the threatened social center Kukutza Gaztetxea:

Tuesday, August 23, 2011

Beit Omar: Residents, internationalists and Jewish citizens demonstrated in slidarity with Gaza, where the IDF terrorist organization murdered 15 people. Five were arrested and one cruelly abused.

Bil'in: Residents with internationalists and 30 Jewish citizens walked through olive groves occupied by the IDF, which make up some 30% of the village. They reached the apartheid wall demanding the freedom of Marwan Barghouti and other political prisoners and chanting support for the UN recognition of Palestine as member state.

And many other protests.

Palestine: Jewish settler protesters begin infighting on the issue of Apartheid. The quite pointless protests of Israeli youths in Tel Aviv about to be broken on whether the rights of Palestinian Arabs are important or not. A sector of protesters held a vigil for the colonists killed without any mention to those murdered by the IDF, others meanwhile chanted Jews and Arabs refuse to be enemies, while the first ones accused them of traitors and of stirring civil war (as if there was not one already). ··> Haaretz.

Japan: Prof. Chris Busby (European Committee on Radiation Risk) interviewed in Japanese media: I’m too frightened to go closer to this site than 100 km… And even 100 km I’m not too happy about ··> videos at Energy News (English with Japanese subtitles).

Japan & World: Arnie Gundersen (retired nuclear engineer) denounces that the tent being built around Fukushima I reactor no.1 is actually going to send the radiation further away, solving nothing. He denounces that Japan must acknowledge the severity of the problem if it is to fix it at all ··> video at Fairewinds Associates.

Science: ecological half-life of Cesium-137 is 5-10 times larger than believed ··> Ex-SKF.

Astronomy: 'Snow White' is actually red. A lot of new information about one of the less known (and as of yet unnamed) dwarf planets in the Kuiper Belt area ··> Science Daily. Check also the blog of Mike Brown, the discoverer.

Snow White's red apple? (artist's rendering of 2007 OR10)

Opinion: I'd rather not be Anna [Hazare] by Arundathi Roy ··> Indian Vanguard, originally at The Hindu. I feel that it's important to expose the fascist fraud of Hazare and Roy, as always, does marvelously.

Opinion (in Spanish):¿Arde el Mundo? (Is the World Burning?) by Luis Britto. Or how to evolve from indignation to revolution, using as reference the English Revolution of 1645, the French Revolution of 1789 and the Russian Revolution of 1917.

Uganda: large demos against high cost of life and Museveni's government repressed by police ··> WSWS.

USA: testimony of the slow programmed death of those held in isolation ··> Uruknet.

The Aguán belongs to us

Honduras: more murdered in Bajo Aguán in spite of massive military deployment. Yesterday we mentioned the murder of MARCA's President Secundino Ruiz, today we must inform of the killing of MUCA's Vice-President Pedro Salgado and his wife Reina Mejía. ··> LINYM[es].